Psalms

The Psalter is Israel’s hymnbook: lament, praise, thanksgiving, royal psalms, and wisdom. It trains the heart to speak to God in trouble and in joy, and it points ahead to the Messiah.

Author: David and others
Date: c. 1400–400 BC
Theme: Prayers and songs for every season of the life of faith.
Key verses: Psalm 23; Psalm 51; Psalm 119:105
American Standard Version

Psalms 58

1For the Chief Musician; [set to] Al-tashheth. [A Psalm] of David. Michtam. Do ye indeed in silence speak righteousness? Do ye judge uprightly, O ye sons of men? 2Nay, in heart ye work wickedness; Ye weigh out the violence of your hands in the earth. 3The wicked are estranged from the womb: They go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies. 4Their poison is like the poison of a serpent: [They are] like the deaf adder that stoppeth her ear, 5Which hearkeneth not to the voice of charmers, Charming never so wisely. 6Break their teeth, O God, in their mouth: Break out the great teeth of the young lions, O Jehovah. 7Let them melt away as water that runneth apace: When he aimeth his arrows, let them be as though they were cut off. 8[Let them be] as a snail which melteth and passeth away, [Like] the untimely birth of a woman, that hath not seen the sun. 9Before your pots can feel the thorns, He will take them away with a whirlwind, the green and the burning alike. 10The righteous shall rejoice when he seeth the vengeance: He shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked; 11So that men shall say, Verily there is a reward for the righteous: Verily there is a God that judgeth in the earth.

American Standard Version (1901). Copyright expired. Public domain.